Still working on the railroad

Niles Depot Museum expands model tracks at 100th anniversary

By Kenneth Lim
CORRESPONDENT 

FREMONT -- There are mountains and streams in the basement of the historic Niles Depot Museum. There are farms and towns. And there are trains running on railroad tracks. 

It's all built about waist-high, and about 87 times smaller than in real life. 

Ever since the Tri-Cities Society of Model Engineers helped save the depot from demolition in 1982, the elaborate landscapes built by the society have drawn visitors to monthly open houses. 

As the depot turns 100 this year, the model-train hobbyists are expanding their HO-scale layout -- a 1-to-87 scale model -- to almost double the current 80 feet of tracks. 

When the expansion is complete, tracks will wind along the perimeter of the 1,512 square-foot room, connecting with an existing island in the middle of the room and giving society members longer and more complex routes on which to run their miniature trains. A smaller, N-scale (1-to-160) layout is on display in another room in the depot. 

"It's going to be a lot of fun," society member Ed Bingle says. 

Members meet every Tuesday and Friday night to lay out new tracks, connect electrical circuits, create scenery and, when time allows, play with their trains. Stanley Keiser, former vice president of the club, estimates that the project will take at least a year to complete. 

Everett Jacobs, president of the club, says he spends up to eight hours a week on club affairs and on his specialty, making miniature buildings. 

Mark Prochnow, who coordinates the expansion project as the club's superintendent, says the group could always have more members to help with the expansion. 

There are about 40 active members, mostly men, Jacobs said. Most members are working adults who have rediscovered a childhood hobby. 

"Most of us built model railroads as kids, then we went to college and discovered girls," Keiser says. "The interest comes back after you start working." 

Jack McDonald says he knew nothing about model trains when he joined the group nine months ago. Now he can hold his own in discussions with the other members about which models are the better ones. 

The key to a good model is the attention given to details, he says. 

"If everything is done to scale, it's harder to build but it's more realistic," he says. 

But many members of the club, including McDonald, say they are not "rivet counters," or people who value the accuracy of the models so much they fault model cars without the correct number of rivets. 

The club is not very particular about creating an historically accurate landscape, Keiser says. Although the types of buildings and terrain along the tracks are meant to resemble real places -- such as Fremont, Union City and Newark -- much of the layout is created on the whims of the members. 

Track layouts are changed on the fly, and members are eager to try new designs. Camouflaged among industrial plants on a section of a route is a recycling chute for aluminum drink cans, the brainchild of Bingle, whose latest experiment is using layers of clear resin to model streams. 

The members share a passion for model trains, but they disagree about which aspects of the hobby are most enjoyable. 

On a recent evening, for example, David Wegmuller spent his whole time studying circuit diagrams and wiring up new tracks while an animated Bingle explained how mountains, bridges and buildings would complete the picture. Keiser said he thought scenery was unimportant and could do without it. 

"That's what's good about the club," Bingle says. "You don't have to do what you don't like and the outcome will still be pretty good."

Open house at the Niles Depot Museum is from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on the first and third Sundays of every month. The depot is at 36997 Mission Blvd., Fremont. Information: (510) 797-4449 or http://nilesdepot.railfan.net.